Anger of wartime sex slaves haunts Japan and South Korea

Women forced into working in frontline military brothels keep up pressure on Japan for direct compensation for war ordeal

Kang Il-chul, a former Korean sex slave who was 15 when she was taken from her home to work in Japanese military brothels in China during the second world war.
Photograph: Justine McCurry for the Guardian for the Guardian
Justine McCurry for the Guardian/Guardian

Kang Il-chul was 16 when Japanese military police arrived at her home in South Korea and told her she was being conscripted. The year was 1943, and her country was just two years away from liberation after 35 years of brutal Japanese colonial rule.

Kang spent the remainder of the war in occupied China, as one of tens of thousands of Asian women forced to have sex with Japanese soldiers in frontline, makeshift brothels. "I was put in a tiny room and made to sleep with about 10 to 20 soldiers a day," says Kang, pausing to display the scars on her head – the result of frequent beatings by the military police. "I was punched and beaten so much that my body was covered in bruises. I still get headaches."

Almost 70 years after Japan's defeat, the treatment of such "comfort women" still haunts its relations with South Korea as the region, embroiled in long-standing territorial disputes, once again confronts the legacy of Japanese militarism. Lingering resentment over atrocities committed during the second world war – and the perception that Japan has failed to show enough remorse for its actions – help explain the periodical outbreaks of anti-Japanese rage in the region, and the angry reactions to high-profile visits to Yasukuni, the controversial war shrine in Tokyo.

"Historical grievances in Korea do not depend on who is in charge in Japan," says Jeff Kingston, director of Asian studies at Temple University in Tokyo. "They simmer on and on until every once in a while they boil over. Tokyo is living in a dream world if it believes that these matters are resolved and not worth addressing," he said.

Earlier this week, South Korea repeated its demand that Japan acknowledge its use of former sex slaves and compensate them. "Japan's legal responsibility has not been settled," the country's deputy chief envoy to the UN, Shin Dong-ik, told a UN committee. "Those acts were a crime against humanity."

Japan retaliated last week by deciding not to renew a $57bn (£35.5bn) currency swap with South Korea – a measure designed to protect both countries against financial crisis – although officials in Seoul and Tokyo said the decision was made on economic grounds and the territorial dispute was not a factor.

Lee's remarks were in part a vote-winning exercise for his conservative Saenuri party before December's presidential election, but also proof that wartime history still weighs heavily on the South Korean national psyche – and finds voice in an enduring suspicion of Japan.

There is disagreement on the exact number of women forced into prostitution by Japan. Campaigners believe between 50,000 and 200,000 women – mostly Koreans, but also Chinese, south-east Asians and a small number of Japanese and Europeans – were forced or tricked into working in military brothels between 1932 and 1945.

Fearing ostracism in their own countries, most took their secret to the grave. But in 1991, Kim Hak-soon, a South Korean, became the first to testify about her wartime forced prostitution experiences in public. "We must record these sins that were forced upon us," she said.

Since then, more than 230 women have identified themselves as former sex slaves. Only about 60 are still alive. Eight, including Kang, live at the House of Sharing, a facility that opened in 1992 in the hills south of Seoul.

The women, most of whom are in their 80s and 90s, say they have yet to receive an official apology or compensation from Japan over their treatment.

The Japanese government initially denied the existence of "comfort stations", as the brothels were known. But in 1993 Yohei Kono, the-then chief cabinet secretary, acknowledged and apologised for the first time for Japan's use of sex slaves during the second world war.

Japan refused to directly compensate the women, saying all claims were settled by postwar peace treaties. In 1995 it set up the privately run Asian women's fund, which drew on donations, but many women rejected any redress unless it came directly from the Japanese state. The fund was disbanded in 2007.

The spread of frontline brothels followed the Japanese imperial army's sweep through large parts of China and south-east Asia. As colonial ruler of the Korean peninsula since 1910, Japan had easy access to local women, targeting poor, uneducated and single females aged between 13 and 19.

On display in a museum near the women's residence are photographs, documents and exhibits that shed light on their wretched existence before they were abandoned by fleeing Japanese troops at the end of the war.

Typically, they were forced to have sex with 10 to 30 men a day in dimly lit rooms furnished only with beds. Condoms were washed and re-used and offered little protection against sexually transmitted diseases. Medical examinations were infrequent, and many women became addicted to the mercury 606 used to treat syphilis. Forced abortions were commonplace.

Surprisingly, the Japanese comprise about two-thirds of the estimated 15,000 people who visit the House of Sharing every year. In the past, the residents were happy to meet members of the public, but in recent weeks some have refused to talk to Japanese visitors. "They wonder why Japanese visitors don't go home and tell everyone the truth about the comfort women," said a Japanese member of staff who did not wish to be named.

After the war, Kang settled in north-west China where she married a local man and worked as a nurse. She did not return to South Korea until 2000, and these days speaks her native tongue with a heavy Chinese accent.

She and other former comfort women have maintained pressure on Japan during weekly demonstrations outside its embassy in Seoul. Last December they conducted their 1,000th protest.

The 85-year-old, who was given the Japanese name Tamako Okada while working in military brothels, said Japan's recent backpedalling would only prolong the agony of former sex slaves. "To hear Japan's leaders accuse us of being liars makes me sad and angry," she said. "I have nothing against ordinary Japanese people. This is their government's fault. The prime minister says there is no proof that we existed. But I am living proof."

Japan's war apologies

Earlier this month, a large billboard appeared in Times Square in New York. Beneath the question, "Do you remember?" is a black-and-white photograph from 1971 of the former German chancellor Willy Brandt kneeling before a monument to victims of the Warsaw Uprising. That simple gesture, the signs says, "promoted reconciliation in Europe".

It continues: "In 2012, Korean women forced to work as sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during WWII are still waiting for a heartfelt apology from Japan."

Japan is often accused of never matching Germany's remorse for its wartime conduct. In fact, Japanese leaders, and its current emperor, have issued several apologies and expressed remorse. In addition to compensation agreed in postwar peace treaties, Japan points out that it has since extended generous aid and development packages to its former victims.

On the 50th anniversary of the end of the war in 1995, the then socialist prime minister, Tomiichi Murayama, said: "Japan, through its colonial rule and aggression, caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly those of Asia.

"In the hope that no such mistake will be made in the future, I regard, in a spirit of humanity, these irrefutable facts of history, and express here once again my feelings of deep remorse and state my heartfelt apology."

Two years earlier, Yohei Kono, then the chief cabinet secretary, acknowledged that the Japanese military had coerced Asian women into sexual slavery.

The Kono statement, according to a recent editorial in the Korean press, deserves praise for "extending its sincere apologies and remorse to all those who suffered immeasurable pain and incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women".

But it is the nature, and perceived insincerity, of the apologies that continues to trouble China and South Korea.

For the 60 or so surviving comfort women, previous expressions of remorse do not go far enough; instead, they are demanding an official apology and compensation directly from the Japanese government.

In 2007, they won support from the US House of Representatives, which passed a resolution urging Japan to "formally acknowledge, apologise, and accept historical responsibility in a clear and unequivocal manner" for the coercion of young women into sexual slavery.

Demands for a formal apology and compensation will continue, at least as long as Japan, in Lee Myung-bak's words, refuses to summon the "courage and wisdom to look squarely at history".